Last week, we attended the first-ever FleetForum event. Hosted by Scott Goldman, the CEO of FleetForum, it brought together a select group of fleet managers with a select group of vendors for two days of intense interactions, networking, and learning.

For the fleet managers, it was an opportunity to see presentations, interact one-to-one with senior leaders (in GPS/AVL, leasing, fuel cards), and meet many other vendors that have an impact on their day-to-day fleet operations. For the vendors, it was a chance to show what makes them different, and to communicate the value that they bring to fleet management.

A few of our observations on the fleet managers that we met:

• This is an educated group that is clear on where they are going and what they are looking for.
• Most are aware of GPS and AVL solutions from a fuel management and idling point of view. Few are aware of the numerous ways that a full-featured GPS and AVL solution significantly impacts their business.

We found it compelling how many fleet managers we talked to want to know about the safety aspects of a GPS/AVL solution. For individual drivers, they want to be able to monitor and work with their drivers to improve their driving habits. In several cases, there is concern for single or small teams of workers who use their vehicles in remote locations. And many fleet managers—whose businesses deal with industrial applications (oil and gas servicing, pipeline construction, and other industries—have concerns about where their assets and drivers are located and what they are doing from a liability point of view.

We were pleased to be able to speak with such an educated group of fleet managers and show them that Webtech Wireless can help them use our GPS and AVL solutions to achieve fuel savings, change driver behavior, and reduce risk as it shows up for drivers and fleets.

The Port of LA and the Port of Long Beach are respectively America’s largest and second largest ports. About half the containers coming into each port are destined for the California market. The other half are trucked a few miles to railway yards where the containers are loaded onto trains for shipping to the rest of the US. Either way, it takes a massive number of trucks every day to move the newly-arrived containers out of the ports.

For many years, one of the biggest challenges of both ports has been vehicle emissions. A combination of older trucks idling while waiting to pick up loads wasted millions of gallons of fuel while polluting the atmosphere.

Working with Cascade Sierra Solutions, the ports have replaced many of the older vehicles and, using our Quadrant solution to measure idling, dramatically reduced the amount of idle time. In fact as of 2010, there was 50% less elemental carbon—an indicator of diesel particulate matter—in the nearby town of Wilmington as compared to 2006.

Cascade Sierra Solutions uses US government loans and grants to help fleet managers improve their fleet performance. In many cases, our Quadrant solution is used to give fleet managers insight into how their fleets are performing overall and how individual drivers are changing their behaviors to improve fuel economy. As Jeff Johns, truck manager for Cascade Sierra Solutions, says about fleet managers:

“We want Quadrant to help not only with the optimization of your goods movements, but your actual CSA ratings, your fuel economy, the health of your drivers overall on a big-picture scale, and being able to provide them with timely reports that are accurate so that they can track and they can actually make improvements.”

Making a difference to the environment and making a difference to the business of managing fleets. That is both the promise and the reality for customers like Cascade Sierra Solutions and their clients.

Last December, we visited Steve Minter at the Kentucky Department of Agriculture. Steve has been rolling out our Quadrant solution throughout the state in the vehicles he manages. The Kentucky Department of Agriculture is responsible for a wide range of activities, including:

• Regulation and inspection, (including every retail weigh scale in the state, eggs, amusement rides, pesticide use, and fuel pumps)
• Teens and tobacco
• A veterinary office
• A marketing division, (which runs farmers’ markets and promotes Kentucky agriculture products around the world)

Many people at the Department of Agriculture work remotely and by themselves. There are obvious safety concerns, which Steve has addressed using Quadrant to gain visibility into where vehicles are located. Steve helps ensure safety of workers by conducting remote physical vehicle inventory checks using Quadrant—something that was impossible to do before Quadrant. Steve has used Quadrant reporting to move from re-active to pro-active management of his fleet.

With innovative solutions like this, Steve’s long-term vision will provide a positive impact in all areas for which the Kentucky Department of Agriculture is responsible.  Customers, such as Steve, continue to show us new and innovative ways to use Quadrant on a day-to-day basis as a great telematics, automated GPS, and automatic vehicle location solution.

Dwight D. Eisenhower Executive Office Building

Last week, Michael Smith, CTO of the Webtech Wireless NextBus division attended an invitation-only meeting with the US Chief Technology Officer, Aneesh Chopra and Deputy Secretary, John Porcari. NextBus is the #1 provider of public real-time transit information in North America. Using information from transit agencies like Los Angeles, Boston, Toronto, and New York, Michael and the team at NextBus created the best real-time passenger information system in North America. Their leadership is why they were at the White House Executive Office Building meeting with US thought leaders on public access to real-time transit information.

In addition to vendors like NextBus, there was representation from the Association of Public Transit Agencies, Open Plans, and Google. The focus of the meeting was how to make more real-time transit information publicly available. For example, some GPS vendors require transit agencies to sign exclusive contracts that preclude them from sharing the GPS information with the public.

Aneesh Chopra reminded participants that the Obama Administration’s Open Gov initiative suggests that, “Openness empowers people with information to make decisions”. This has proven the case with examples such as JP Lick’s Ice Cream Store in Boston, which uses NextBus information to provide customers with real-time arrival information. Store patrons can enjoy their ice cream while an illuminated sign in the store  scrolls through the times of the next two buses on Route 39, which passes their store (full story here).

NextBus has shown the way in providing openly accessible data feeds. The White House wants to see more leadership like this in real-time transit information systems.

Making a big business change often feels like storm clouds are brewing on the horizon. Just as sailors must decide whether to stay safely in harbor, you must decide where the business benefits are and whether the storm of working through the change is worth it.

Today, every project involves IT in some way and there are no projects with more storm clouds than those involving IT. For years, IT project failure rates have been averaging 65% or more.

Creating business change success means focusing on a few key elements:

Business Case: The business case has to drive the change, not IT or technology. The business benefits you are trying to achieve must be clear, measurable, and focused on the results you want to achieve.

Executive Buy In: The senior executive team must buy in to the change and have clear insight as to why the change is taking place.

Project Plan: Key individuals must be identified and assigned specific who, what, and when tasks which they are held accountable to.

Organizations often change key business systems once a decade or two. Leading vendors are helping organizations successfully through business change every week. Their experience, people, and processes are what insure that projects finish on time, on budget, and solve the business problem they set out to solve.

At Webtech Wireless, we have seen lots of storms over the years of assisting clients make business change to use the information from our telematics solutions to make measurable change to their business, while taking the risk out of projects with our proven methodologies, systems, and people.

Do you have the all the knowledge and experience that you need to make it through the storm of business change of deploying an automated GPS and AVL solution?

The GPS/AVL and telematics industry has been developing for a long time. Webtech Wireless started business in 1999 and today we have over 100,000 subscribers using our telematic solutions. While creating a new technology market can feel like climbing a mountain, now is a good time to join us on the trail. The routes are well defined and we are here to make it easy for you to gain the insight, benefits, and cost savings of deploying a telematic solution.

To give you some idea of the growth of the telematic market, here are some of the latest statistics:

• The total Mobile Resource Management (MRM) US market will grow at a Compound Annual Growth Rate (CAGR) of 15.9% from 2010 to 2013 (Source: Licht & Associates).
• The North American forecast for the number of fleet management systems in active use will have a CAGR of 12.6% from 2010 to 2015 (Source: Berg Insight).
• Global telematic component markets will grow at a CAGR of nearly 21% from 2011 to 2016 (Source: BCC Research).

These growth predictions demonstrate that telematic solutions have moved out of the early adopter category and into the mainstream. The reasons for adopting and deploying a telematic solution for your fleet include the following list from an MRM presentation by Licht & Associates:

Increased Productivity: Increase the number of jobs per day and more productive driving miles.

Improved Customer Service: More timely response times, real-time status updates, and tighter service windows.

Cost Savings: More efficient routing, fuel reductions in the 5-15% range, and reduced maintenance costs in the 10-30% range.

Risk Management: Accident reduction, lower insurance costs, accident reconstruction, and asset recovery.

Regulation/Green Initiatives: U.S. Senate Bill 3884 (installation of electronic on board recorders), CONTRAN 245 in Brazil (installation of a GPS tracking device on new vehicles), and vehicle re-routing as a key way to reduce miles in a transportation green initiative.

We have helped clients in all these areas and are enthusiastic about being part of the growing telematic market in 2012 and the future.

At the Fleet & Asset Management 2011 conference, Conal Deedy, Solution Manager for Volvo Group Telematics gave the presentation “Fuel Management Systems: The Indispensible Investment”. In his talk, Deedy highlighted the fact that 31% of operational costs in trucking are fuel. In a low margin business like trucking, the effect of lowering fuel consumption by 5% can lead to an increase of 18% in company profitability.

Deedy asserted that these are the biggest factors affecting fuel consumption:

• Vehicle specification and configuration
• Aerodynamics
• Weather, road, and traffic conditions
• Vehicle maintenance
• Driver behavior

Take something as simple as tire pressure. According to Deedly, 50% of all truck tires are more than 10% under-inflated. A -10 PSI tire inflation equates to a -1% mpg reduction in fuel economy.

As we have documented in our white paper “Telematics ROI: The Human Factor” each 1 mph increase in speed over 55 mph reduces fuel economy by 0.1 mpg. Deedly stated that the most efficient drivers get about 30% better fuel economy and idling can account for 30-60% of a vehicle’s operating hours.

To save costs and increase profits, trucking companies need to focus on fuel savings. The best performing ones know that altering driver behavior requires both coaching and monitoring of drivers. Telematics solutions like ours give you the tools to both monitor and provide drivers with feedback to improve their fuel economy.

Wayne County in Detroit, Michigan has released an innovative new portal called Compass. Combining information from many different sources, including real-time information from our InterFleet solution, citizens can see what is happening on their streets as they happen.
Dealing with snow and keeping roads clear is a challenge for Wayne County. In the article Wayne County drivers get high-tech link to roads, The Detroit News documents how Wayne County is deploying Compass so that citizens can both see what roads have been plowed and view projections of where the snow plows will be next.
Wayne County, like many of our clients, use the unique features of InterFleet to provide a seamless view to stakeholders by using the information interfaces of InterFleet to connect disparate systems together. The creativity of customers like Wayne County results in an enhanced user experience for the viewer.

As the article reminds us, InterFleet also provides critical information such as the speed of snow plows, salt usage, and coverage. Customers use this information over time to reduce their winter material costs by up to 30%.
How can you use real-time GPS and Automatic Vehicle Location information to create information for your stakeholders?

At the TMW Transforum 2011 conference, I was interviewed by Michael Carpentier, CEO of Big Truck TV on risks that keeps fleet managers away at night. Michael has published the interview where I share my thoughts on how to mitigate risk and let managers sleep at night.

The U.S. Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration (FMCSA) introduced the CSA initiative in 2009 to improve truck and bus safety and reduce commercial motor vehicle (CMV) – related crashes, injuries, and fatalities.

For more information on the CSA initiative, view the following resources and tips:

• Why is CSA needed?
• How does CSA work?
• What is the timeline?
• What is your role?
• Frequently Asked Questions about CSA
• Review Data

Find out how Webtech Wireless transportation fleet management solution can help you comply with CSA and improve the safety and security of your fleet.

• Greater insight to driving behavior
• Monitor vehicles and track vehicle diagnostics and maintenance information
• Receive notifications of auto-enabled maintenance schedules and alerts for upcoming brake inspections, engine oil changes, vehicle trouble codes, etc.
• Set speeding thresholds and receive email alerts when your mobile workers have exceeded the defined limit
• Pinpoint dangerous driving behavior, and the option of a flashing LED in the vehicle also alerts your driver to slow down
• Support Text-to-Speech and Voice Command Recognition
• Configure in-cab Mobile Data Terminal devices to prevent messaging use while driving vehicle
• Leverage hands-free dialing or 1-button push options
• Access comprehensive vehicle scorecards that provide speeding, unsafe maneuvering, and hard braking counts to help you assess your mobile workers’ driving behavior, any unsafe driving habits, and guide your mobile worker into becoming a better driver

Automated Hours of Service and IFTA Fuel Tax Reporting

The Webtech Wireless Driver Log feature in Quadrant addresses both the US Department of Transportation and Transport Canada’s Hours of Service regulations. With instant access to driver information such as the duration a driver is behind a wheel (starts and stops), when breaks occur and the length of time between driver shifts, Transportation companies are able to meet regulatory requirements, maximize driver efficiency and eliminate manual errors. Integration with ProMiles IFTA, provides operators with accurate data on miles driven within each state and automatically generates fuel tax reports for efficient compliance with tax regulations.